Saturday, August 1, 2015

Today we decided to take a ride up to
Eugene and look around.Roland checked
the net before we left so that we would have a specific destination.

came out extremely small because it was taken with my cell phone

The historical landmark sits upon a
hill.Many stairs lead to the
house.It reminded Jenna and I of a veggie
tale's Sock Drawer in which one feature is a reinactment of the three stooges
moving a piano

The initial look on their faces as they look up to see all those stairs

I couldn't find a picture that showed ALL the many stairs

watching larry do all of the work

The history of the house and owners was
interesting.I took a lot of pictures -
though the majority of artifacts were actually just condusive to the time
period and not the house itself.It was
still very quite interesting.

The pictures are not in order of how I took them. Different rooms, different floors - but as most all of the artifacts were donated to give a visualization to history, I don't suppose it matters

taken in the girls room

taken in the office - all three owners had dr. breadwinners.
all three doctors died in this room. I thought that was interesting.

the McMurphy family

was obviously not taken from the best angel

this came out darker than I expected. Our guide said this room
would be equivalent to what we call a family room

not the original fireplace. But it looks authentic

part of the girls room

miniature in the attic part of the house. Our guide said
that it took eight years to create and ended up
costing more than the actual house that we toured

Friday, July 31, 2015

Jenna
does NOT deal with change well.She is
horrible at it.Horrible.I don’t even remember what it was she was
complaining about last night.I told her
that whatever we do, wherever we live, no matter what, there are going to be
some things that we like about our current situation and some things that we
don’t.

I
told her to write a list of pros and cons with living in West Valley and with
living in Myrtle Creek.I didn’t suggest
for her to include Kearns – after all she was only five when we had moved.
There was probably more drama about that move than there was with this last
one.

After
reviewing her lists, I decided to make some lists of my own.Thus for this post, I have decided to share
each list that was created (or started at least)

Jenna’s
pro list for living in West Valley

1)school
friends

2)church
friends

3)good
principal (Mrs. Randolf is truly amazing)

4)FAMILY

5)More
time with dad (they had actually eaten breakfast together)

Jenna’s
con list for living in West Valley

1)a
certain individual from school

2)church
friends live in apartments

Jenna’s
pro list for living in Myrtle Creek

1)same
answer as number one on last list

2)swim
lessons (pool in general)

3)friends
made

4)a
library

5)a
bike

6)good
people

7)Netflix

Jenna’s
Con list for living in Myrtle Creek

1)mom forced me to be in band before school even
started

2)have to practice the clarinet

3)missing friends from West Valley

4)Barely anything to do (EVERYTHING IS IN
ROSEBURG)

5)Missing family

6)Less time with dad [who’s still working according
to mountain time and eats breakfast at his desk or long before Jenna gets out
of bed]

My
pro list for living in West Valley

1)public
transportation

2)conveniences
(driving locations)

3)playing
games with family members

4)dual
immersion

My
con list for living in West Valley

1)dry
air

2)traffic

3)construction

4)small
house

5)no
sidewalks

My
pro list for living in Myrtle Creek

1)I
can more easily breathe

2)Low
crime

3)Best
house

4)Strong
ward

5)Opportunities
that Jenna will have in this school as opposed to Salt Lake (such as low income
rental on instrument and swim lessons that didn’t get cancelled due to a lack
of numbers)

Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Though Roland seemed anxious to
purchase a house right away, I still don’t know what city I would like to make
my permanent resident.I love Myrtle
Creek. Everyone’s been so friendly and it really did not take long to warm up
to things.

Roland has always looked at the house
itself.My primary concern is with the
neighborhood, the ward, the area itself.The house is only secondary.But
I do love this house we’re in right now – though we are just renting and
haven’t even bothered looking at a house to buy – though Roland still seems
anxious to do that very thing.

School is so expensive, and if we can
find a home now, Jenna will have a better chance of going to school in Oregon
for a much lower cost than her brothers.MUCH LOWER – but we have to be homeowners.But I also believe we need to be making more
money than our budget allows at this time.As renters, we do not have to pay property taxes.I find that to be a plus right now.

I do know we’ll need to move eventually.But let’s let Jenna do a year or two of
middle school at least.I thought I’d
want to move her to a bigger high school, but I’m finding that I really like
those that graduated from So. Umpqua High.But I don’t know that I could last six or seven years more in this
county.Eventually I’m going to need to
go back to public transportation.

I don’t remember yellow flowering
plants with thorns even existing when I lived on the east side of state street growing
up in Salt Lake City.But after I got
married and moved to the west side, thorns were an everyday part of our
life.Both houses we were in.We couldn’t help but step of them.

They were constantly being dragged into
the house and it seemed to house needed to be swept and vacuumed more often,
but somehow thorns were always left behind.I could never go barefoot in the house, let alone outside.In Myrtle Creek, I’ve been able to do both.And it’s been wonderful.

When we lived in West Valley, there was
no garbage disposal hook-up.I am so
used to scraping garbage out of the sink and throwing it away that I forget we
have access to a disposal in the house where we currently live.

We also have a place to put our table and call a dining room

We have a lot more closet and cupboard
space and just a lot more space.It is
so awesome to be able to walk from room to room without bumping into walls or
furniture because everything is narrow and small.

We have water pressure!Something else I have truly missed the last 5
½ years.I love being able to do dishes
in more than just a trickle of water.I
can even do dishes when the washing machine is running – something I couldn’t
even fathom in West Valley. Taking showers is also a lot nicer.

I had a laundry room when we lived in
Kearns, but not in West Valley.My
desire was to move the appliances outside, wall up that area and have more elbowroom.The washer and dryer are now in the garage
where one might think I have more elbow room, but with a refrigerator on one
side and a car on the other, the space might actually be tighter than in West
Valley.

In West Valley my washer opened to the
left and my dryer to the left opened down.It was kind of a bother to attempt to push clothes over one door and
hope they would land in the dryer or at least of the door – though I wasn’t
happy with having too much weight.Now
my doors open opposite directions.

I found a system that lessens the
inconvenience of having two doors in between the washer and dryer.I take the clothes out of the washer and put
them in the basket.I put the basket on
top of the dryer and clothes the washer drawer.I move my body over to the tiny space in front of the dryer and take the
clothes down and put them inside.Wish I
would have thought to do the same when we lived in West Valley. I’m not
complaining because there are so many other features about the house that I
love.

I love having shelves to put things.I love having a coat closet (not that we’ve had
a need for it as of yet) None of the houses I have lived in have offered coat
closets.

I love having access to electronic
communication, for I still miss those that we left behind in Utah.I am grateful that Roland was able to bring
his electronic position with him and still has a job regardless of where we
live.

Saturday, July 25, 2015

As we sat on
the curb to wait for the parade to start,I was reminded of a time Roland had taken Jaime and I to Midvale to watch the Cinco de Mayo parade. I remember our eternal wait for the parade to start and how
unpressed I was when the first 5 -13 vehicles that followed the emergency
vehicles (which usually lead the parade) as the utility trucks and yellow
construction vehicles that followed (not to mention the firetrucks) were seen on a day-to-day basis when we
were living in Kearns.

This morning I wondered how similar the parade might be to that one – but than my expectations weren’t very high (good thing) though. I did
to expect to see more floats and perhaps less monster trucks or big wheeled
vehicles or whatever you call them.

I also thought there would be at least one band. There was only one instrument that made its way into the parade - and not one that I expected to see.

organ player in the cart provides only music

Yesterday the annual three hour parade
was held in Salt Lake City Utah.I knew that it would not last that long but was
surprised that the creek in Myrtle Creek lasted nearly 40 minutes.All entries could be entered last
minute.Salt Lake participants start a
month or two ahead – at least.Even with the
youth parade that is held the week prior, entries are created ahead of schedule and not just an hour to five minutes before the parade gets started.(see this post)

Many of the floats, bands, etc. get the opportunity of being in both
parades.Or maybe it’s just a selected
few.I don’t know.I like my parades short and quick. Today may
have been quicker but some of the monster contestants were either showing off
or the drivers were just having a hard time with moving so slow – as it sounded
though some had actually restarted their engines.But what do I know about monster
vehicles?Nothing.

We had actually seen more farm equipment
here in Oregon than we did at the parade we had gone to in Star Valley,
Wyoming.

Each time we do watch a parade –
no matter how small – we are introduced to one thing that we have never had
exposure to at seeing in a parade.Today’s
unique interest (maybe not those who recide in Myrtle Creek or surrounding
areas – but to us) it was the logging truck.

My favorite thing to look at though
was this dog – who seemed to want to play fetch each time the candy was
thrown.His reaction made me laugh.He really was fun to watch.

Jenna had a great time at the park –
playing games for rocks and prizes.

She
could have played longer but we dragged her away.We may return for fireworks – but just did
not want to hang out for twelve hours.

Today is the last day of the festval.Our sleepy little town has been wakened – well for this weekend at
least.

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About Me

I am a mother, a sister, a daughter, a friend . . . I am a memory preserver and I enjoy learning. I have read a few Blogs and am a bit reluctant about starting my own. I don't believe I have anything pertinant to add to the Bloggers walk of life. (to learn why this blog is so named, read my first post created January 1, 2012) http://beneaththewraps.blogspot.com/2012/01/introduction-beneath-wraps.html